In her Rattlesnake Lake photographs, Jones explores a watershed through the lens of her camera with a blurred figure moving in and out of sharpness throughout the series of prints. Chris Pugh-Ukiah Daily Journal.

A Place to Rest features photographs of every bed Jones slept in during her post-graduation mobile lifestyle. Chris Pugh-Ukiah Daily Journal.

The Space Between Here, a photography show by Tomiko Jones, opens at the Mendocino College Art Gallery on Thursday, September 21, 2017, from 4-6 pm. Chris Pugh-Ukiah Daily Journal.

Tomiko Jones looks at the world through her photographic lens, and finds connections to her own life and experience. On Thursday, Sept. 21, 2017, from 4-6 p.m. the Mendocino College Art Gallery will present the photography of Jones, a faculty member, who received her master of fine arts in photography with a certificate in museum studies from the University of Arizona. She has exhibited her work extensively throughout the country, has taught at several universities and is currently teaching photography this fall at Mendocino College.

Jones, who was born in Los Angeles, says that a unifying element throughout her work is a connection to water. She says that “I feel like water is a big part of the migration passage of my family because if you live in North America, your family has probably migrated across the water to get here.” She says that most of the places she photographs have a definite ecological bend to them and that while her work is not a social documentary, there is a distinct environmental aspect to most of what she creates.

While most photographers these days are concerned with megapixel counts and if their camera has built-in wifi or not, Jones chooses to create her photographs using traditional and alternative process methods. The photos in her portfolio are all created using either 35mm, medium or large format film with cameras that most people would leave on a shelf to admire but never use.

The show, which Jones is calling “The Space Between Here and There,” features photographs from several of her long-term projects which focus on the geography of transitional spaces between land and water, thought and action. In the main area of the gallery, visitors will find three large photographs printed on silk fabric hanging from the ceiling. The photos in this series were created after the passing of Jones’ father and are from a project she calls Hatsubon which is a memorial service held in honor of a loved one who has passed on. The memorial service is an opportunity for family and friends to strengthen their relationships and to deepen their understanding of life through the process of the ceremony.

In the back portion of the gallery, visitors will find photographs from Rattlesnake Lake (2014), A Place to Rest (2008-Present), and a series of Cyanotype pictograms made using a photographic printing process developed in 1842 by an English scientist and astronomer named Sir John Herschel.

In the Rattlesnake Lake photographs, Jones explores a watershed through the lens of her camera with a blurred figure moving in and out of sharpness throughout the series of prints. To create an even deep connection to the photographs in this series, Jones used water from the lake to wash the film while developing the negatives. The prints displayed in this series are platinotypes, which use a nineteenth-century recipe of platinum and palladium hand-coated on paper which is then exposed to ultraviolet light to create the final print.

Rattlesnake Lake is the overflow reservoir for the drinking water for the City of Seattle and was originally an indigenous sacred site that was later heavily logged, and because of erosion, the nearby town of Moncton flooded and had to be moved.

“When I first went to photograph Rattlesnake Lake, because of its history, the place felt eerie to me, partially because of the stumps and constant changing levels of water,” Jones said. “The lake went from being something sacred to being devastated, and then becoming a site of nourishment, a place of life. The figure in the photographs feels like an apology to what had happened there.”

In A Place to Rest, Jones chose to photograph every bed she slept in with her Rolleiflex camera, as a way to slow down and consider where she was during her post-graduation mobile lifestyle of residencies, academic migration, and nomadic movement associated with her creative life.

The Space Between Here and There will be on display until Oct. 19 at the Mendocino College Art Gallery. Regular gallery hours are Tuesday through Thursday from 12:30-3:30 p.m. and by appointment. Jones will hold an artist talk on Sept. 28 at 4 p.m. in room 5310 in the Center for Visual and Performing Arts at the college. For more information visit www.mendocino.edu or phone (707) 468-3207. You can find Tomiko Jones online at www.tomikojonesphoto.com.